Families should move to Best Start Foods

17 March 2020

Families
who get Healthy Start vouchers must ensure
they move to Best Start Foods before the vouchers stop on Tuesday 31 March 2020
to continue to receive support.

The
new Best Start Foods payment card replaced the UK Government’s Healthy Start
vouchers last summer. The payment card works
in the same way as a bank card and can be used to buy a variety of foods in
any shop that takes card payments.

Eligible
families on low income benefits get £17.00 every four weeks for any children
between one and three years old and during pregnancy. For babies up to the age
of one, the payment increases to £34.00.

Between
12 August and 31 December last year almost 18,000 families were issued with a Best
Start Foods payment card. These include people applying for the first time, as
well as existing Healthy Start voucher users who have already made the move to
Best Start Foods.

Social
Security Secretary Shirley-Anne Somerville said:

“Almost
18,000 families in Scotland are getting Best Start Foods payments helping them
access healthy foods for their children they may otherwise struggle to afford.

“But
with UK Healthy Start vouchers stopping in Scotland at the end of this month we
don’t want families missing out on any money they are entitled to. So if people
currently get Healthy Start vouchers, and have not yet made the move to the new
system, we would urge them to apply for Best Start Foods as soon as possible.

“We
want people to access all the benefits they are entitled to, so when people
apply for Best Start Foods, we use a single application process to check if families
are also eligible for any of the three Best Start Grants. This ensures families
are getting all the financial support available.”